Richard "Bugs" Burnett's national column and blog on gay life and gay culture across Canada and around the world

Tuesday, 24 April 2012

MONTREAL'S FAMED DIVERS/CITÉ FEST MOVES FROM GAY VILLAGE TO OLD PORT IN 2012

Montreal drag icon Mado La Motte greets her public at Mascara which will hold its 15th edition at Jacques-Cartier Pier in the Old Port, where Divers/Cité has moved their festival site for 2012 (Photo courtesy Divers/Cité)

The times they-are-a-changing.

The single most important and influential gay event in the history of
Montreal was the police raid of the Sex Garage loft party on the night
of July 14, 1990, in Old Montreal, which directly inspired Bad Boy Club Montreal
to organize the BBCM’s first Black & Blue
circuit party in 1991, as well as laid the groundwork for Montreal’s Divers/Cité Queer
Pride March that Puelo Deir co-founded with Suzanne Girard in 1993.

Together, over the next decade, Divers/Cité and Black & Blue
would transform Montreal into a choice gay tourism destination, pushing
Tourisme Montréal to create a gay tourism template since adopted by
tourism authorities worldwide.

In 2007 Fierté Montréal (Montreal Pride) took over the parade and community day previously organized by Divers/Cité, while Divers/Cité continued on as Montreal's internationally-renowned Divers/Cité queer arts and culture festival, which in 2012 runs from August 2 - 5.

But 20 years after Divers/Cité and Black and Blue put Montreal on the international gay map, this year Divers/Cité is moving their festival site from the Gay Village to the Jacques-Cartier Pier in the Old Port.

"Motivated by a desire for growth and by the increasing constraints of
its previous site, the organization has made the decision to move its
outdoor stages to a space better suiting its needs and the expectations
of festival-goers," Divers/Cité explains in a prepared statement. "The recent move of Terminus Voyageur to Berri
Street, the reduction of available space in Émilie-Gamelin Park and the
sector’s recent vocational changes have made further development
perspectives for the Festival in the area near impossible"

Up until last year the City of Montreal was actually pressuring
Divers/Cité to move to the city’s new Quartier des Spectacles. The hope
was Divers/Cité would move some of its mega-events there, like Mascara, 1
Boulevarde des Rêves and Le Grand Bal.

“We got an order from our board to move [last year]," Divers/Cité's director general Suzanne Girard told me on the eve of last summer's festival. "But we
couldn’t because the First Peoples’ Festival – usually held during the
summer solstice [in June] – have Place des Festivals [at the same time].
They were forced to do their festival then because Spectra moved their
FrancoFolies festival from August to June.”